A Blog by Dauphine Press

We’re back with our Wedding Invitation Wording Guidelines and the final element that most couples add or consider adding. The last bit of essential information that you want to share with your guests has a place in the final line (or final two lines) of your wedding invitation.

The first thing you want to consider when finalizing the additional details that fall after the TIME + PLACE is your wedding reception. If you will be including a reception card in your invitation suite and providing details on time and location for your reception on a different card, then you can keep things pretty simple on the last line of your invitation. Here are some great examples:

The festive “feast and merriment to follow” line on our Loire wedding invitation indicates to guests that the reception will take place at the same hotel as the wedding ceremony. That’s all guests need, just this one simple line lets them know that all of the event is happening at a single location.

Another gorgeous example on our Vizcaya wedding suite. The great thing about this line is that it works for casual, modern and traditional invitations.

Speaking of casual invitations, the final line on this custom version of our Arbor invitation adds a fun twist with the “dinner, dancing and tomfoolery to follow” line! What a great place to show your personality!

The couple that chose our Tulipa design included “cocktails, dinner and dancing to follow” at the end of their invitation indicating to guests that the reception will start with a cocktail hour, which also helps guests choose their attire.

Speaking of attire, this final line of an invitation is often where you find details on attire. Above is our Occidental invitation that simple states “black tie preferred”. For this more formal affair where the reception takes place at a different location than the ceremony, the couple did choose to include a reception card. They kept all reception information on the separate card, leaving room on the invitation for the note on attire.

We have said all along with our Wedding Wording series that the final choice is up to you and no matter what etiquette states, you should go what feels right for your event. We love that the elongated shape of our Broadmoor design allow for multiple lines of additional details. In this case, the reception is at a separate location and we’ve included not only the fact that the reception will follow the ceremony, but the name of the location as well.

And, always fans of keeping it simple, the most common version for the additional details line is the ever-popular “reception to follow” as shown on our Hamilton suite.

With that, we’re ready to wrap up our Wedding Invitation Wording Guidelines. We’ve covered all of the essentials and options in every category from the Invitation Line, the The Couple and Time + Place. We would love to work with you to finalize the personal details of your wedding stationery. Contact us today or visit your local retailer to select your favorite elements for your wedding day!

How is your wedding to-do list coming along now that we’re into the thick of the first month of the year? We’re ready with another post in our series covering Wedding Invitation Wording Guidelines. We have already covered the Invitation Line and the The Couple so now we’re on to Time + Place.

TIME + PLACE
This portion of the invitation is essential. As with any section of your invitation, be sure to double-check these details so that they are 100% correct. It couldn’t hurt to triple-check when it comes to the time + place. Falling into the same traditional, modern and casual styles; the date, time and place can be listed in many different ways on a wedding invitation.

On a traditional invitation, we always recommend sticking with wedding etiquette rules, which will have your invitation looking a lot like our Larkspur suite. This layout begins with the day of the week and day of the month {all spelled out} with the year and finally the time on a third line. Following the date/time, the location comes next. If you are including separate directions and details for your wedding ceremony and/or reception location, you can include just the name of the location. If you will not have a separate card with details, don’t forget to include the address on your invitation!

Even when a couple chooses a more modern or casual invitation line, we do often see them use this same format for the time + place, just to be sure that guests are clear on the fine details. Plus, keeping the basics in traditional format really means your modern or casual style on the invitation line will really stand out.

When couples want an allover casual feel, we often see the use of numerals and non-traditional layouts for the time + place. A few inspiring samples from our collection:

Our Sonoma invitation mixes numerals for the date but spells out the time and location, which allows the design details and graphics to frame these important lines beautifully.

Another great way to allow your modern format to make a statement is to go with a horizontal format and put all of these details on just one or two lines like our Primula wedding invitation suite.

Our Stinson invitation uses the traditional layout, but we chose different font styles and sizes to add interest and a decorative look to this design.

We hope that with our tips, your wedding invitation wording feels like a fun and easy task. If you have any questions, or if you’re ready to see it on your wedding invitation, contact us or one of our exclusive retailers!

We’re wrapping up our tips for the Invitation Line of your wedding invitation wording. The invitation line can sometimes be tricky since family politics can be involved. We’ve covered the traditional route and the modern route for the invitation line {that’s the line on our invitations that indicates who will be hosting your wedding} and today we are going to cover one more option – casual.

INVITATION LINE – CASUAL
One of our goals in offering a custom design process for creating your wedding invitations was to allow every couple to personalize their stationery so that it truly reflects their personalities. It’s fun to see fun personalities shine through in the more casual designs we help couples create.

Today we’re sharing a collection of our favorite invitations with a casual invitation line. Hopefully, these will provide you with inspiration! A bonus, if your wedding day style is more traditional, you may want to consider one of these options for your rehearsal or brunch invitations.

Our Roseberry design begins with a gleeful exclamation! This sweet start really sets the tone for this casual wedding.

There’s something to be said for keeping it simple. Our Vreeland design is a perfect example of simplicity making a big statement. In addition, just using first names of the couple keep things casual.

The type treatment used on the names of this couple make quite a statement. The day is all about you! So, why not select a script font with all the embellishments to celebrate the new couple like our Lavinia design!

With the three main options for the top portion of your wedding invitation wording, next up we will cover the best ways to display your names and the Time + Place of your wedding; followed by additional details you need to share with your wedding guests.

We’re back with our next post in our Wedding Invitation Wording Guidelines! It is very important to finalize the wording on your wedding invitations before you have us begin the design process. It’s going to be in print and will be something that you will keep always, so it is best to focus on the wording alone as your first step in the process. Plus, getting this tough task out of the way means that the design process can be all about making it look good and complement your wedding decor!

As we noted in our last post, we’ve broken it down to four main sections: the invitation line, the couple, time + place and additional details.

INVITATION LINE – MODERN
In our first post of this series we covered traditional wording and the common rules of etiquette for the Invitation Line when your parents are hosting {paying for} the wedding. For today’s post, we will be covering a modern interpretation of the Invitation Line. More and more we see brides and grooms hosting their own wedding and excluding the tradition of having their parents listed on the invitation.

We’ve gathered a collection of examples to show you how an invitation comes together when the couples’ parents’ names are not included. You may choose this for a number of reasons, but we often see couples select this option when they are hosting their own wedding, when the family politics are just a tad too complicated to spell out on an invitation or when the couple wants to keep things simple and keep the focus of the invitation {and their wedding day} about them and their new union!

As with the traditional version, the second element of the Invitation Line with a modern twist is also the actual invitation or call to action. Just after the listing of the hosts, you’ll want to include “request the pleasure of your company at the marriage of …” or “invite you to celebrate the marriage of …”. It’s pretty much the same for both traditional and modern wording, with a few exceptions. With the modern versions, you will see the addition of phrases such as “because you have shared in their lives …” and “together with their families …” appearing before the names of the betrothed and in place of the parents names. We’ve collected a few examples to show you how these come together!

Our Yountville suite incorporates modern wording and a modern look. Here you see the use of “because you have shared in their lives” along with “through your love and friendship” to really involve the guests in their special day.

Our Greenwich wedding suite makes a bold statement with the names of the couple listed first in a decorative script typeface.

A great way to include your family, but not include all of the names of the parents is to choose words like the ones shown on our Calistoga wedding suite, which begins with “together with their families” before the names of the couple. And below on our Pacifica wedding invitation, you see this wording again, but in a classic layout for those wanting modern wording, with a traditional look.

This series has been a ton of fun for us to put together. We love sharing the tips and secrets we have learned over the years as well as go through old samples for lots of gorgeous inspiration! Feel free to contact us with any questions or topics you would like us to cover.

Recently we shared our best tips and favorite links for addressing your wedding invitations. Taking a step back today, we are giving our advice on one of the first items to check off of your wedding invitation to-do list – the wording! In a series of posts we will discuss a few of the common rules of etiquette along with tips we have learned after years of designing and printing endless variations of wedding stationery.

We know you’ve probably never written an invitation from scratch before, so we wanted to break it down into the different sections to keep things simple. We’ve broken it down to four main sections {and multiple posts}: the invitation line, the couple, time + place and additional details.

INVITATION LINE
The invitation line can be the toughest section for some couples, so we’ll start there. Since there are so many options, we will just be covering traditional wording in this post and will follow-up with more casual and modern options in additional posts.

Traditionally, the invitation line was determined by who was hosting {paying for} the wedding. If the bride’s parents are hosting, their names are listed first. This can be a sensitive area though with more and more couples paying for their own weddings, both sets of parents contributing and with divorced and/or remarried parents. We say follow your heart here. If you and your fiance are paying for the wedding, but you like the tradition of listing the bride’s {and/or groom’s} parents first, then do it!

The second element of the Invitation Line is the actual invitation or call to action. Just after the listing of the hosts, you’ll want to include “request the pleasure of your company at the marriage of …” or “invite you to celebrate the marriage of …”. We say go with the version that you like best, but keep in mind that traditionally “honor” or “honour” used in this line {ie. the honor of your presence at the marriage of …} is reserved for church ceremonies.

For inspiration, take a look through the many different ways we have worded traditional invitations with our Search by Style feature. Below are a few examples and highlights!

This sweet variation of our Sonoma wedding invitation suite {featuring a blush, apricot and pearl foil color palette!} shows a great example of traditional wording with the bride’s mother hosting the wedding.

This version of our Larkspur wedding suite includes a classic layout with the bride’s mother and father both mentioned, but the shift to using the more casual “invite you to celebrate” lightens the mood a little bit.

Our Broadmoor invitation displays a classic example of traditional wording with the bride’s parents listed and the use of “honour” indicates that this is a formal affair with the ceremony taking place in a church.

We love the way this couple decided to word their invitation! What a great way to honor the parents of both the bride and groom. The layout on this customization of our Occidental design could also work well for divorced parents.

We’re excited to be kicking off this series and we hope that you find it a valuable resource! We have many more tips and visual eye candy to help you design the ideal invitation for your event.